Archive for September, 2017

Last night, I got an email from an internet marketing company who knows nothing about marketing and nothing about me. How do I know? I simply read his marketing email to me.

It started like this:

I’ve been following your blog for some time now and I just had an idea that I think you’re going to like.

[Uh oh. Reminds me of guys who would come up to me in a bar in college and say, “Hey, I bet you’d love to dance with me.” I’ve never heard of this guy before and already he has an offer I can’t refuse.]

He continues:

We help companies double their sales using Internet marketing tactics such as Search Engine Optimization, Social Media Marketing and Pay per Click.

[Whoa, Nellie! Isn’t this the same work Aly and I do for our clients? But he said he’d been reading my blog “for some time now,” so why doesn’t he know this about me? After all, there’s a category on my blog called Internet Marketing. ]

I’d love to work with your clients to help them grow their businesses.

[I bet.]

Obviously, you wouldn’t recommend someone you don’t know, so I’d like to analyze your website and Internet marketing strategy, and put together an Online Marketing Plan for you.

Okay, now I’m laughing so hard, I’m sliding off my chair. Had he read my website, he would have known:

I teach classes and give speeches on Internet Marketing Strategy and SEO.

90% of my marketing is done via the internet.

I have excellent rankings on Google for “small business coaching,” “small business consulting services,” and “mastermind group” — I don’t really need SEO help, thanks very much.

Then I stop laughing. And a weird angry-calm comes over me. This guy is a liar and I hate that. He doesn’t care diddly-squat about me and my business, he just wants someone to help him make sales for his company.

Good Marketing is About Building Relationships First

The first mistake he made was not really getting to know me before he tried to sell me something. One of the internet marketing gurus says it’s akin to meeting someone new and saying, “Wanna get married?” in the first five minutes of conversation.

Rule #1: Create rapport with your customer. Get to know them. Strike up a conversation in their blog comments, in Twitter or Facebook, in online message forums, or via email. Meet them at events. Go out and give speeches or classes, then chat with the participants afterwards. Let them know you exist and you’ve got some great resources to share.

Find Common Ground

Rule #2: See if your prospective customer has a problem you can help solve or a dream you can help fulfill. Don’t assume they have a problem or dream: ask them.

No Speed Dating Allowed

Rule #3: Stop trying to make the sale in the first conversation. Relax and enjoy the unfolding of a new relationship. Don’t look desperate and don’t hurry them along just to get your needs met. Always, always, always look for a win-win.

I wrote this blog post years ago, when Hurricane Sandy was upon us, and updated it for Katrina, then Matthew and Harvey. Now we have a new one coming our way: Irma. So I figured this was the perfect time to re-post this!

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Our offices are right in the cross-hairs of Hurricane Sandy. Here are some tips for running your office “offline” in case you lose electric or access to the internet, from all my wonderful Facebook Friends!

Karyn Greenstreet First tip would be: Contact clients and students to tell them the office might be closed.

Suzanne Hiscock This is a preventative tip: Don’t skimp on webhosting/servers if you have an online business.

Shannon Cherry Power up everything you can before hand. If you have my-fi, know how to use it. Power up meaning- fully charge!

Christine Clifton be aware of what you access ‘in the cloud’ and take steps to backup files/data on your hard drive/a toast drive – so you can work ‘offline’

Suzanne Hiscock Oh, and make backups of your entire site if your website is hosted in the storm’s path.

Karyn Greenstreet Print out important files, so you can work offline even if your computer isn’t available. Include all important email addresses and phone numbers.

Maureen Flatley Internet based email has been a godsend too. We live on the water, north of Boston and have a lot of flooding and power outages. You can’t plan for everything but there are some basics. When we have lost power for more than 24 hours and couldn’t access our technology it reminded us that you can’t completely eschew paper records and that we lived for years w/ out email or texting.

Christine Clifton set an out of office message on your cell/email, letting people know what’s going on and you may be offline.

Maureen Flatley I put all of my important documents into email so I can access them from anywhere for any reason. So if I’m in midstream w/ something – which I am today – I can get to it if I decamp to another location.

Karyn Greenstreet That reminds me, Maureen…I use Evernote for the same purpose. I have Evernote on everthing so that no matter where I am, and what machine I’m using, I have everything at my fingertips.

Donna Soffen take care of any (in this case) end of the month autoship changes or additions before you lose power. and contact anyone in your upline/downline that isnt in the storms potential path & ask them to help take care of any customers/new recruits that might enroll or purchase from your site that they can see from their backoffice- on your behalf.

Karyn Greenstreet Another tip: get a blank journal. If your power is out for 5 days (like ours was last year), there’s nothing so scrumptious as writing “by hand” again. 🙂

Karyn Greenstreet Good idea, Angie, and Panera Bread has wifi and outlets, too … as does our local library.

Marlene Hielema Pen and lined paper to write with so that if your computer runs out of battery power, you can still jot stuff down. Books to read. Deck of cards to play manual solitaire. Scrabble game.

Karyn Greenstreet Another tip: backup all your files, preferably to an online backup service like Mozy, Carbonite or iDrive. That way you can access everything from a new computer, if yours gets damaged in the storm.

Sherice Jacob Invest in a UPS in case the power goes out, you’ll have a few minutes to save everything.

Carole Sevilla Brown I’m with Sherice. My power back-up gives me about an hour and a half reserve power. This is a good reminder that it would be a good thing to have a few evergreen posts in reserve for times like this. And I’ve got lots of batteries for my digital voice recorder because I do a lot of “writing” that way.

Lisa Wood have a car charger on hand to charge your phone, plus an adapter to charge other electronics

C.J. Hayden Give your clients and team members a backup email to reach you in case your usual one goes down. Has happened to me more than once with natural disasters and regional power outages.

Terri McMahon Zwierzynski Thanks for reminding me to backup my website (every Monday!) Honestly, I’d find it hard to focus on work, with kids and dogs and the whole differentness of the situation. So I’d go with a good book, candles/lanterns, a deck of cards and a few boardgames.

C.J. Hayden Oh, and if your phone service is a landline, make sure you have an old-fashioned handset that requires no power to operate. You may keep phone service but lose power. Happened to us in the ’89 San Francisco quake.